WORKING CLASS HERO

This is just a little video I did that I thought would be a good way to start off this blog. It is a tribute music video to John Lennon via performance of his song "Working Class Hero" which was originally released on John Lennon's Plastic Ono Band album.

I remember how I first came into possession of the original album on vinyl when I was very young. I was attending school and I was just not into being there whatsoever. I was always the daydreamer of the class looking out the window at the clouds. Most teacher's words fell upon deaf ears because I was busy listening to the soundtrack of music in my mind. I could always hear music whether it was songs that I knew from the radio, or just that wonderful cosmic noise that one can tune into.

When I wasn't at school I was furiously busy trying to learn how to play guitar...a crappy old acoustic guitar that was a hand-me-down from my oldest brother George (I know...George...right?) George had moved up in the guitar world having recently purchased a Fender Mustang, and it was a beautiful candy apple red one complete with the white rally racing stripe diagonally painted across its finish. Being the opportunist that I was, and in seeing George's happiness in showing off his new prize, I said to him "So...George, now that you've got a real guitar what are you going to do with this old basher?", as I pointed to his worn out no-name brand acoustic guitar. He said "I dunno...do you want the thing?" HAH! So I was now the proud owner of what I always later referred to as "The Fingerbuster!"

George showed me how to tune the guitar but little else so I was on my own down the road of discovery of how to actually play a song. I started out just laying the guitar on my lap, sorta how you'd play a lap steel guitar, only in place of a glass slide I'd just thump on the low E bass string as I learned how to play the basic pattern to "Smoke On The Water."

I had a friend who lived a few blocks away named David. He saw my interest in learning the guitar and kept telling me of his older brother Marvin who was away in the Army and how good he was at playing guitar. He also told me that in a few weeks Marvin would be home for a few weeks on leave. I was anxious to meet Marvin having heard so much about him...oh yeah, and the fact that Marvin actually owned a very cool Fender Coronado guitar! I didn't even know what one of those looked like but it sure sounded cool.

The weeks trudged past and I finally got to go over to David's house to meet Marvin. When Marvin showed up he was dressed in his Army dress uniform carrying a duffle bag in one hand and a guitar case in the other. My first impression of him just outwardly is that he looked rather freakish because he had one of those buzz-cut hairdos underneath what he referred to as a "cunt cap." After he made warm and fuzzies with his fairly large family, we went out in the front yard and I showed him "The Fingerbuster" and he laughed when I called it that. He then said oh so proudly, "You want to see a real guitar?" as he laid down his guitar case and undid the latches. When he opened up the case it was as if the sun and sky immediately reflected off of the guitar and I could hear all the angels sing..."Ahhhhhhhh!" The guitar was beautiful and was one of those cool looking semi-hollow electric guitars with "f" holes and a vintage sunburst finish so it looked very much like the Fender version of an Epiphone Casino which was of course the main guitar that John Lennon used after switching from his black Rickenbacker.

WOW! I was speechless. Marvin stood up and strapped the guitar on and started playing some old song from the original Woodstock concert...a song called "Coming in from Los Angeles" I think. I watched his hands make the chords and strum and I knew I had to know what he was doing...immediately!

Marvin was a very cool and completely laid back guy and despite the 4 or 5 year differences in our ages, we had similar personalities and common likes in certain types of music...mainly the music of The Beatles! I practically moved in with my friend's family while Marvin was there and spent endless hours trying to watch as he played and he'd show me basic chords and we'd play and sing until our fingers nearly fell off. Marvin recognized one thing about music that I was better suited for than him, and that was singing. I thought anyone could sing, since it was something that apparently came to me naturally so I just always assumed everyone sang. Well, I guess everyone does sing...just some are better suited for the shower than the stage.

Marvin had this song book... "The Greatest Hits of Lennon and McCartney"...it had a Day-Glo orange and white striped cover! You could flag in jets at the airport with that book! It nearly glowed in the dark! He showed me one of the most important things I ever learned in the process of learning guitar aside from how to tune the things; how to read those little square chord charts with the dots that show you where you're supposed to put your fingers. When he went back to finish his time in the army...I think he had a year left...he let me borrow that book! You must realize how important that was to me, I was just a poor, young teen with a hand-me-down guitar and absolutely no money for such extravaganzas as songbooks. I treated that book with the reverence of some old holy tome! Wherever I went, there also would be that book! I couldn't believe how hard it was to try to play those guitar chords...even the easier ones like E minor...I was having a fit of frustration thinking I was taking too long and that I'd never get it right...but kept twanging away every chance I got in sheer determination.

Oh yeah, as I mentioned I was still in school (not in me head though) and besides carrying round whatever grocery paper bag covered text book I was hauling through those hallowed halls of repression, I had that psychedelic song book as well! While in classes I would, throw the song book in front of my text book and just scrutinize the chord charts, as if only I could just look at them long enough, then I would somehow magically be able to play them.

One day in class a dark haired girl named Kim who sat a few desks behind me in Health Class saw The Beatles songbook as she was walking by me and out of the class. She asked me if I liked The Beatles and I managed a well articulated "Yeah" through my dangling, long-hair covered face. She asked me if I knew how to play guitar and I lied and said "Oh, yeah...guitar is great, you know!" Then came the inevitable question..."So, who is your favorite Beatle?" I'm sure I must've said "John!" before she even finished the question! She said that he was also her favorite as well and then came the one that got me..."Have you ever heard John Lennon's Plastic Ono Band album?" I said, "No, I really don't think I've heard that one!" trying hard to not sound like I wasn't in the know of every note ever recorded by "The Fabs" other than checking it out in the record bins. She smiled and told me that I had to hear it and how great it was and just went on and on to the point where I started to feel like the poor little bugger that I was, not being able to afford such luxuries as Beatle solo records! I mean I was lucky to have The Red & Blue albums and Sgt. Pepper and The White Album that I had gotten one Christmas and played until I was ejected from the house by my mom. Oh yeah, and the original American United Artists version of the album Hard Days Night that I had "borrowed" from my sister's record collection while she was going through her horrible Bobby Vinton stage!

Kim said words that sounded very sweet indeed when she nonchalantly said "Look, if you want, I'll bring my copy to class tomorrow and you can borrow mine!' Did I mention here that I really, really, really love woman who love The Beatles?...because they are always nice like that. Imagine a day where I actually looked forward to going to school and didn't lay out playing hooky. Sure enough, the very next day in walked Kim with the Plastic Ono Band album tucked under her arm along with a purse and a book. She immediately handed it to me and then asked me if she could look at my songbook. "Girl, right now you can look at anything you want."

I even let her take the songbook home with her that day, as sort of a trade...and I would have never thought that I would have let that book out of my sight...but it was "only right!"

Now it was the weekend and I put the record on the only record player in the house which was located in the living room. It was one of those big and bulky pieces of furniture that was also a radio with STANDARD BROADCAST emblazoned across the dial. As the record pulled past it's intro groove of scratchiness in came John Lennon's beautiful music in a way that I really had not previously heard. It was stark in it's production, yet beautiful in it's soul. The lyrics of all the songs blew me away and nearly made this long haired hippie nearly blush or even cringe...but I was hopelessly addicted and never looked back. Of course here I was playing an album in the center of the house that had lyrics that kept saying "FUCK-FUCK-FUCKING!" My mother went ballistic and nearly scratched the needle across the record in her hurry to stop the sound coming out of the shiny gold Lemay covered stereo speakers! She was beside herself..."How can you listen to this FILTH?" "What the hell is this and where did you get such a thing?" I looked at her in utter disgust and said nothing at all because I had already learned that a working class hero was something to be!



This video was recorded by me in my home studio on February 14th, 2008 : Valentine’s Day. I am playing my Epiphone John Lennon Signature Limited Edition Acoustic 6-String Guitar (not at all a “Fingerbuster”). I played to a solitary Shure studio microphone which was directly plugged into some old Sony Video Cam-corder.

Peace & Love

8-)